Old Man Mace
by oharrop
Summary: Mace Windu died a long time ago. When a small town on a small planet in the Outer Rim starts to gain unwanted Imperial attention, the local sheriff cannot help think it might have something to do with the mysterious stranger the townspeople call The Mage. He is powerful, he is attune to things they cannot understand, he is their best chance at repelling the Empire.
1. Chapter 1

I

The Town Of Dented Armour

Bright stars begin to flower across the sky. By night, those of Ma'ar Shaddam could look up at the endless black abyss and see the velvet cocoon enveloping them punctured by the pinpricks of distant light, distant suns. But no one on Ma'ar Shaddam did look up, for the stars were only a painful reminder of the better lives the people of those faraway planets surely had. Easier to look at the grit beneath your feet.

Ma'ar Shaddam spun on, tracing through the darkness on its slow, elliptical orbit of a hard sun, and its people went with it.

The town of Maksur was spat out on the wrong side of the planet; Ma'ar Shaddam's only hub of activity and promise was in the other hemisphere, a lifetime away, if a scrapheap spaceport and a few factories of the weaponsmiths and armourers of old could be counted as forming such. Maksur was a town made of whatever scrap the bitter wind managed to blow that way, and the inhabitants too found themselves living there only at the behest of an ill breeze. There was a loose gathering of houses, squat little huts of canvas and torn sheet metal stuck together with mud, a few shops, of which half dealt in the long forgotten bits and pieces of ancient ships, and a tavern, the most popular place in Maksur. Once or twice every trip round the sun, a supply ship turned up from the capital, bringing a few medical supplies, shipments of food, a great deal of liquor, and whatever else the pirates operating it couldn't sell anywhere else.

Pirates ruled the Rseik sector. The Empire cared not for small, insignificant, backwater worlds, and although the Rseikharhls had left a few LE-VO droids on Ma'ar Shaddam, most of them operated within the industrial city of DuuFaan, the capital, and outside of that any Planetary Security Forces were a joke, outgunned and outmatched by the pirates. But pirates aren't all bad, and indeed those of Maksur surely relied on their benevolence; if they decided to stop making their trips out to Maksur, the town would wither up and die.

There was one employee of the Ma'ar Shaddam Planetary Security Force in Maksur, the town sheriff, though since it was the pirates themselves who delivered her paycheck, Persie Hotarv's job was mostly limited to making sure no one got too drunk and tried to fight a moisture vaporator.

Persie stood outside the tavern's front door as the regular parade of patrons came tumbling out. She counted each, making sure they were in a fit state to walk home, not that it was ever very far, rather like a shepherd watching over her flock.

'G'night, Sheriff,' Ginger slurred, the old Dressellian stumbling away with a respectful nod.

'Goodnight, Ginger.'

Eventually the steady stream of the inebriated stopped, and it seemed that the tavern had emptied itself, but the sheriff knew there was still one more to come, a difficult one, a one who seemed to enjoy creating trouble for her.

Persie stepped into the bar, and sure enough, Knud Rr was pointing a short, ugly-looking blaster at the tavern keeper. The Duros behind the bar had his hands up, but didn't appear particularly phased, not least because this was becoming a regular occurrence.

'Evening, Persie,' said Deon, his big red eyes blinking slowly as a thin smile spread across his lips. Deon, the owner of the tavern, was probably the richest man in Maksur, not that that meant much.

Persie returned his smile, though hers formed itself more as a grimace across her grime streaked face, and she stepped up to Knud.

'Howdy, Knud. Fancy putting the blaster down for me?'

It took a moment for the big H'nemthe to focus his swimming vision onto the short human woman who was standing before him, her hands on her hips, but when he finally saw through the grog, a huge grin broke out on his face. Knud swung the blaster around to point it at the sheriff, although he was having a hard time holding it steady, and Persie felt confident he would have a harder time actually hitting her should he actually decide to shoot. Deon went back to cleaning glasses.

'Sheriff Hotarv! This is nice,' cheered Knud. 'Are you going to beat me up again tonight? Or perhaps even throw me in that cell of yours?'

'No, Knud. I'm going to send you home to your wife.'

'Ack, the worst sentence of all!' He laughed uproariously at his own joke, and holstered his blaster, managing to slide it back into its home after a couple of attempts. He stepped forward, unsteadily, and stared playfully at Persie. She knew what was about to happen.

Suddenly, Knud swung at her, bringing around a huge, three-fingered fist that he would have very much liked to see make a connection with the sheriff's face. But he was drunk, and he missed, and with a little push in his back, Persie used the big brute's own momentum against him, and Knud went tumbling to the floor.

'Alright,' he mumbled, 'let's go home.' He scrambled up to his feet and leant heavily on the tavern doorway, starting out into the darkness. He called back over his shoulder: 'Same time tomorrow, Deon. Have 'em lined up and ready.'

The tavern keeper only grunted a reply. Persie and Deon watched him go.

'You know,' offered the Duros, 'you should send him back to DuuFaan, he gets worse every night.'

'He's harmless,' the sheriff shrugged. 'Besides, you'd have no customers if I shipped back every difficult drunk we've got.'

'Touché.' Deon slipped into silence, and the sound of the Ma'ar Shaddam night filtered into the tavern, settling between the two of them until Persie realised the conversation was over. She slipped quietly out of the tavern and out onto the endless desert beneath the stars.

The gritty sand swept away for hundreds of miles in every direction, only a shallow mountain range a few days ride to the north offered any disruption to the dead horizon. Persie Hotarv felt for all the people of her town, felt for those all so like Knud; this was a lonely place to live, a lonely place to work, a lonely place to die. She ran a hand through her thick hair and tried to avert her mind from such dangerous thoughts for one could quickly lose oneself in the pit of all that despair that accompanied Maksur. More often than she cared to admit she thought of it as neglect of her duties to keep the people suffering here, that perhaps she should just find a way for them all back to DuuFaan, back to the closest thing Ma'ar Shaddam had to civilisation. But that wasn't her job. Her job was keeping the peace, and for now, the peace was kept.

Persie turned on her heel and began walking back toward her own house at the far edge of the town. It was a very modest abode, a shack adjoined to the slightly larger shack that served as the police station. She strode down the main street, past the shuttered up shops and the still houses of their owners, the only noise anywhere in Maksur coming from Frackel's place, her young son undoubtedly still up and tinkering in her workshop.

The sheriff rapped gently on the door: 'Go to bed, Armand.' And she continued on her way.

Finally, Persie came to her own home, and she felt her bed calling to her. It had been a long day. It was always a long day. She was about to go inside when something caught her eye out by one of the moisture vaporators that stood erect against the desert: a boulder that was not usually there. Her tired legs begged her to ignore it, reasoning that at least she could have a look in the morning, but something pushed her to investigate. She gave a thought to firing up the battered old C-PH patrol speeder and riding out, but even that seemed too much effort, and so she took herself to trudging slowly over toward the mysterious boulder.

As the sheriff got closer she realised it was not a rock, but a man, which would explain why it had not been there before, and as she got closer still, she realised it was not just any man, but one she had had few dealings with. He lived outside Maksur, isolated and alone in a hut way out amongst the dunes, so far out that she wasn't even sure if it was in her jurisdiction. He came to Maksur infrequently, sometimes for food, sometimes for spare parts for farming equipment, but he had lived out here for a long time. There were rumours about him, about what he had done, about why he had come to Maksur. The townspeople feared him.

But he kept himself to himself and didn't cause trouble, and that made him alright in Persie's book.

Still, she approached cautiously, scuffing her feet through the pinkish grit of the desert so that he would not be startled.

'Hello,' Persie said at last, recognising that the mysterious stranger was not going to turn to greet her. He appeared to be meditating, and offered no reply.

'Hello,' she tried again. 'I'm Sheriff Hotarv, I just wanted to make sure you were OK.'

The hooded figure said nothing.

The comfort of her pillow and the sweet embrace of sleep beckoned once again to Persie, the darkness of the night now seeming so heavy and thick around her, as though the very absence of light was weighing her down. But being sheriff comes with responsibilities.

'Do you require any help? Are you hurt? Lost?'

'All is lost.'

His voice was deep, gravelly, each word bitten. 'All is lost,' he said again, somewhat more wistfully, morosefully, Persie thought, though she was perhaps imagining it. The man began to get to his feet, his back still turned to hers, his ragged cloak still obscuring his features. Something cold stirred deep within her, a fear, a tightening of her stomach and a squeezing of her heart; he exuded something unnatural.

The people of Maksur called him The Mage.

He faced her.

'You fear me,' he whispered.

The Mage was taller than Persie, by a good head and shoulders, and though his hood hid him from the starlight, she saw a long silver beard and a dark face badly scarred. He had wide, bloodshot eyes that cradled in them a spark of madness, of darkness, of a strange hunger the sheriff had never before encountered. He was an old man, old enough to have witnessed things that Persie could see in his face that looked carved from ancient wood to be beyond her understanding of everything that was wicked and evil in the galaxy. He smiled, a snarling snicker behind the thick beard. Persie looked down; his fist was made of metal.

She feared him.

'Good,' growled The Mage, and he stalked off into the desert, into the night.

Sheriff Persie Hotarv did not sleep well that night. She tossed and turned in her narrow bed, at times freezing cold and at others dripping in sweat. Her dreams were plagued with spectres. She heard nought but The Mage's words: All is lost.

A foul wind rattled her shack until dawn, threatening to pry loose the walls and blow all her belongings across the rose-coloured sands. At last, when she could bear it no longer, Persie got up and watched the sun rise. The rays did little to warm her bones. As the first signs of life began to emerge from the village, moisture farmers setting their droids to work, the shopkeepers opening up their stores, Persie found herself reluctant to start her daily routine at the station. Being the sheriff of Maksur didn't seem so appealing today, for there was something on the air, an acrid smell, the taste of rust and dried blood. Her nightmares were lingering.

Eventually she found her way to the radio at her desk. The police station was a large square shack, a jail cell big enough for a couple of rowdy drunks in one corner, her desk in the opposite, an equipment cabinet by it, and a few chairs beneath a picture of her family just inside the door. Her family smiled down at her, but she rarely smiled back. Her father had brought her to Maksur when she had been a child; with her dying breath, her mother had apparently foreseen the rise of an Empire of woe and bid her husband to take their baby to a remote town where no harm would befall her beloved daughter. Persie had never believed the story. But then again it didn't matter what she believed, for here she was, and here she was the sheriff.

Persie flicked the switch on the radio and a taut burst of static filled the room, causing her to flinch as she tried to tune it. She tapped at the long range scanners, checking for life outside the parameters of Maksur. Some days she prayed she'd find a crashed ship that she could come to the rescue of, or perhaps a caravan of travellers seeking refugee in her town, but today, as always, the scanners showed nothing. Sheriff Hotarv's sector of Ma'ar Shaddam was as desolate as always.

Frackel, the mechanic came into the station, shuffling through the door nervously. Although the Rodian woman had a brilliant mind for engines and machines, she struggled when it came to organic beings. Her son was a different story. Frackel could fix any kind of ship or droid or device that you put in front of her, but her son, Armand, was her pride and joy. He was outgoing and boisterous, and like his mother had the gift for machines. Armand was getting to a certain age where in the next few years he might start to cause trouble for Persie, but for now, his doting mother kept his mind engaged with helping her in the workshop.

'Morning, Frackel,' Persie said, stifling a yawn. 'What can I do for you?'

Frackel looked at the floor shyly, her hands fretting over one another. Her snout twitched. 'It's Armand,' she began, 'he's done… something.'

'What kind of something?'

She took a deep breath, and Frackel started to spout: 'Well, do you remember last year when the pirates bought all that junk around and Carnegie took most of it but our little Armand begged me and begged me for this one thing, I didn't even realise what it was exactly, but he so wished for it, and you know how I am, so I bought it for him, and he's been tinkering with it for a while, you know how he is, always messing about with bits and pieces, and, well, it wasn't quite as broken as I thought it was, and now, now, now it's doing something.'

Frackel kept up her worrying as Persie followed her back to her workshop, and as the sheriff stepped inside she realised that whatever was happening, it would probably be the most interesting thing to occur all week and as such had drawn a suitable crowd. Persie pushed her way past Ginger, past Knod, who smiled knowingly at her, past Carnegie, one of the scrap and spares dealers, past Deon, who was still in his pyjamas, and up to the side of Armand, the little Rodian boy at the centre of all this fuss. A third of the townspeople stood inside Frackel's workshop. They all stared at something none of them really wanted to see: a large black sphere, trapped in a vice, whirring and beeping and flashing little lights.

'Is that what I think it is?'

'You're damn right, Sheriff,' Knud answered. 'It's only an Imperial crinking probe droid. And this little idiot has brought it back to life.'

Armand wasn't sure whether he should be proud of himself or not, he had done a sterling job on a droid model he had never seen before that had been delivered to him in a state of total disrepair, but the general consensus in the room that the fact he had restored it was a bad thing.

'Well,' reasoned Persie, trying to think on her feet, 'it's not like we've got anything to hide. Shall we just let it go?'

'Let it go,' scoffed Knud. 'Are you out of your mind? I for one do not want the Empire crawling up my backside over some stinking droid. There's a reason I live all the way out here in the middle of the empty bit of the empty bit of space! And it isn't the views! We need to destroy it.'

'If you want to avoid the Empire I highly suggest _not_ destroying it,' Ginger put in, scratching his head. 'They have sensors in, and it's Imperial policy to investigate whenever a probe gets blasted.'

'So can I keep it?' Armand asked excitedly.

'No,' snapped Knud. 'I don't want that thing scanning me.'

'It's not like you'd register as intelligent life,' said Carnegie with a laugh, and a friendly scuffle broke out between them.

Persie looked at Armand: 'Can't you just deactivate it again?'

'I _could_ ,' he said, unenthusiastically.

'Let's just do that then,' the sheriff decided, pleased to hear a mumbling of agreement from behind her. 'Besides, if the pirates had it, and were flogging it for scrap, any investigations would have already been made. It's not like it can die twice, right?'

But then, all of a sudden, none of the discussion really mattered, because the probe droid broke free of the vice and flung itself toward the door, everyone diving out of the way.

Persie ran out after it and watched as the little droid began to tear away across the desert, and then begin to climb higher into the sky. Knud fired off a few wild blaster shots after it, all of them missing the target.

The sheriff and the others could do nothing but watch it go, the sense of the machinations of the galaxy working against them filling them with a dread they had not felt for a long time. Most of Maksur were wanted by the Empire, and the others were certainly no fans. Knud had been right; it was not for the views that one came to the wrong side of a planet like Ma'ar Shaddam.

Persie sighed. 'I have a bad feeling about this.'

Knud sighed too. 'No poodoo, laserbrain.'

The Mage sat out beneath the stars again that night, a little further from the town this time. It helped to be close to living, breathing organisms, as though the energies that flowed through them all could help connect him to something he had not felt connected to for a long time.

He drew a large, callused hand through his beard.

When he looked at the stars he saw the shatterpoints of the galaxy, like the cracks on a frozen lake. Every step made, and those cracks grew, twisted, deepened. Everything depended on everything else, and through all that, a route could be plotted. But that was the old ways, the ways he had forced himself to forget. The Mage cared not for tracing his mind down the cracks of the future anymore; there was nothing there, nothing but misery, desolation. When those fools calling themselves the rebels had destroyed the death star, they had thought they were striking a devastating blow against the Empire, but they were only pounding on the very ice they walked on. Cracks on cracks.

A farm boy blows up a super weapon, and it rains on Ma'ar Shaddam.


	2. Chapter 2

II

The Distant Storm

For almost three weeks, nothing happened. Rain pelted Maksur and the wind roared endlessly, a malicious storm hanging over the makeshift town threatening to wipe it all clean away, threatening to sweep the isolated dwellings off the face of Ma'ar Shaddam. The pink sands fidgeted beneath the storms and the dunes crept up on Maksur, as though the weather, the planet itself, sought to be rid of all the strange refugees and outlaws who found themselves so very, very far from anything else that might be considered civilised.

For almost three weeks, nothing happened, and it appeared that nothing would come of the probe droid's escape. Perhaps the young Armand, Fragel the mechanic's boy, would not bring down the hammer of the Empire upon Maksur with his tinkering. No one in the town dared say it, but perhaps they had gone unnoticed. But still, it played on their minds. Knud Rr did not create any fresh drunken scenes in the tavern, Carnegie the junker didn't try to swindle anyone, all the townspeople behaving impeccably, as if by putting one foot wrong they might lose the disinterest of the Imperials. There was quiet speculation that the droid had gotten lost somewhere, or that the pirates had seen to it, but no one knew for sure. On paper, all this should have made Sheriff Persie Hotarv of the Ma'ar Shaddam Planetary Security Force a happy woman, with an easier job, but she felt the unease. Her sheep grew nervous.

Persie's run-in with the one they all called The Mage had worried her too. He was a stranger in a town of strangers, the loner amongst a population of the lonely. The sheriff was of the opinion that having half-wild demented fools in the desert next door was not a good thing. Late at night, she had taken to watching him. He would come closer to the town's boundaries, walking from some unseen abode amongst the Eastern dunes, and then just sit, beneath the stars, sometimes for hours on end. It perplexed Persie, for she felt sure that he was up to something, but what exactly she had no idea. No one even knew who he was, and this wasn't that kind of town; everybody knew everybody in Maksur, it had to be that way for them all to survive their isolated lives, and for this man, The Mage, to remain so secretive, at a time when she was already on edge… The days since she had approached him, the days since the probe droid had broken free, had been fractured by sleepless nights.

Little Armand had been watching the skies. He had been chastised heavily, apparently by everyone in the town, and now he lived in constant fear that Darth Vader himself would appear and ask him what he had done with his probe droid, and when Armand couldn't answer, the Dark Lord would cut him into chunks with his lightsaber. Armand, like his mother, like many others in Maksur, lived in fear.

And then when the storm finally blew over, and a bright dawn greeted those of the wrong side of Ma'ar Shaddam once again, in came what they had all been dreading.

Captain Kaas Treadwell of the Imperial Army leaned over his pilot's shoulder as they approached a dark spit on the pink horizon: Maksur.

'Funny,' the young captain muttered.

'Yes, sir,' said the pilot, not laughing.

The Sentinel-class landing craft came in low, almost skimming along the sand. Although it had enough space to carry around 75 of the Empire's finest stormtroopers, all armed to the teeth and ready for battle, Captain Treadwell's ship carried only 20, plus himself and the two pilots. He gulped, trying to get rid of the growing lump in his throat and the sinking sensation in his stomach. He supposed that he should feel grateful that he was finally allowed to lead a mission, and an important one at that, but he could not shake the idea that his superiors were sending him to his death, ill-equipped and unprepared. What if the rebels really were hiding out here? It was a remote enough spot, Treadwell thought, remote enough for the scum to plot and scheme quite happily.

'Bring us down here.' He gestured out of the cockpit at a rise in the sands just before the town. The pilot obliged and the craft landed with a soft little bump, settling slightly on the uneven grit that covered Ma'ar Shaddam.

Treadwell straightened up: 'How do I look?'

The pilot turned his head and took in his newly appointed captain, with his fresh-faced boyish eagerness, beguiling a shallow fear behind his eyes. The Empire really was scraping the bottom of the barrel when it came to the outer rim, desperate for anyone to take a little responsibility, especially in the wake of the destruction of the Death Star. He looked back out at the godforsaken hick town where all their deaths might well be waiting.

'I'm just the pilot, sir.'

Persie cursed with all the foulest words she knew. All around her the people of Maksur buzzed with a frenzy she had never seen before, all desperately scrambling to bag up a few essentials and then hole up in their cabins. Evidently the probe droid had made its way home after all.

The sheriff ran into Knud, who had several bottles of liquor in his arms.

'You're not going to do anything stupid,' she asked, raising an eyebrow, 'are you?'

Knud shook his head, tight concern pulled over his face. Persie had never seen the H'nemthe so agitated; it made her wonder why he was so anxious to avoid the Empire, made her wonder what he had done. She couldn't think like that, she hastily reminded herself, not now.

'No,' yapped Knud, 'but if those bucketheads start firing, I ain't dying sober, and they sure as hell aren't taking me alive.'

'Fair enough,' shrugged Persie, and let him go on his way, scurrying back to his shack to hunker down with his wife.

As she began the long march up to the ship, she found her hand twitching over her holster. She didn't know why, for she felt pretty sure that her little DL-18 wouldn't do much damage, _if_ she could actually hit anything. Persie had never had to fire her blaster during her tenure as sheriff, and she was rather proud of that, but today it felt as though her pistol was hankering after spilt blood.

Persie watched as two Imperials descended the ramp from the craft, an officer and a stormtrooper. The trooper had a purple pauldron over his left shoulder.

'Hello,' she said, attempting at breeziness, as though the Galactic Empire landed on her doorstep quite regularly.

The captain looked around, a half-smile lingering on his rosy-cheeked face as he took in the surroundings, his eyes darting quickly over the huts behind her, then out across the desert and the moisture vaporators. At last, he turned his gaze on her and removed his officer's cap.

'Hello there,' he said, offering her a hand. She shook it gingerly. The stormtrooper did not offer the same genial greeting, and Persie could feel the eyes behind the helmet boring into her. 'I'm Captain Kaas Treadwell,' the officer went on, 'and this is Lieutenant Amethyst. We're with the Galactic Imperial Army, and I'm afraid we need to have a look around.'

Persie eyed him suspiciously. His voice was surprisingly warm and he seemed genuinely apologetic, as though this incursion was of great inconvenience and embarrassment to both of them. In her nightmares, the sheriff of Maksur had foreseen her little town being besieged by cold-hearted, war-hardened soldiers of the merciless Empire, not some chipper young thing who looked fresh off the farm. Perhaps it was a ploy. It never did anyone any good to underestimate the Empire.

The sheriff smiled curtly: 'What are you looking for? Maybe I can help?'

There came a gruff growl from the stormtrooper, and the voice that filtered through the helmet, that emanated from beneath those soulless eyes, was that of a man much older than his superior, was that of the Imperials she had imagined.

'Are you this, this… _place's_ official representative? We only deal with official representatives and delegated spokespeople.'

Captain Treadwell shuffled his feet in the sand at the outspokenness of his Lieutenant, but he did not apologise for him. So that's how it would be, Persie thought. Good Imperial, bad Imperial; mad dog on long leash.

'I am Sheriff Persie Hotarv with the Ma'ar Shaddam Planetary Security Force. I am as close to any official representative you're going to find out here.'

Amethyst scoffed. 'Sheriff? I thought this was lawless land.'

'Now, now,' cut in Treadwell, before Persie could bite back. Behind her back, her hands balled into fists, fingernails digging into her palms. An anger swelled inside of her, one she had never felt before. She tried to calm herself.

'So,' she asked again, 'what are you looking for? I'm guessing you didn't come to little old Maksur to see the sights. Cos there's only one.' She gestured at the sea of dunes all around. 'Endless desert.'

Captain Treadwell chuckled. Lieutenant Amethyst did not.

'Unfortunately not,' the captain said. 'Recently the Imperial Navy released probe droids all across the galaxy, looking for… well, looking for some wanted criminals. We're just the grunts, following up the leads.' He smiled, almost sadly. 'One of our older droids actually limped it's way back to the nearest ship, with readings from this quaint town of yours that my bosses thought might require investigating. What was especially interesting was that the droid had supposedly already been decommissioned and destroyed.'

'I didn't realised Imperial droids were in the habit of resurrecting themselves,' Persie teased playfully.

'They're not,' snapped Amethyst. 'Only two kinds of people send probe droids back: rebel traitors trying to lure us into traps, and idiots.'

Persie fell into a solemn silence. Something about the stormtrooper lieutenant unnerved her. Plus, the last thing she needed, the last thing the folks of Maksur needed, was the Empire thinking they were hiding rebels. Or worse, were rebels themselves.

'I think,' she said, softly, 'we may fall into the latter category.'

'Oh well, I certainly hope so,' Treadwell replied cheerily. 'But we are still going to need a look around.'

The sheriff nodded and turned on her heel, leading them back towards Maksur. She prayed none of the townspeople had anything incriminating on them that would require immediate arrest, or that, if these Imperials decided to run background checks, nothing too illegal should be found in any of her people's pasts. Worry knotted deep in her stomach.

'Who is that?'

Lieutenant Amethyst was stood still, almost frozen, pointing a figure out across the desert at a figure standing on a rocky outcrop jutting just above the surface of the sand, hooded cloak flapping in the wind. It was The Mage, and he was watched them.

The knot tightened.

'Oh,' Persie said, aiming for nonchalant. 'That's just some crazy old man whose place is out in the dunes.'

'We don't like crazy old men that live in deserts,' Amethyst snarled. 'They give impressionable young people laser-swords. And bad ideas.'

As he sat opposite her in the station, Persie studied Captain Treadwell. Although he was dressed as an officer, the uniform looked very much second hand; the long coat was battered and scratched, the light armour beneath was scorched and dented, and it appeared a size too big. His skin was youthful and his eyes bright, very much as though all he had experienced of being in the Imperial Army was marching around a base somewhere, saluting at things. But he was a captain alright, she could tell from the way he held himself, a kind of starchiness to his posture that you didn't get in the rank and file. Maybe she was just reading too much into it, maybe he just liked his job.

She decided to ask: 'Do you enjoy being an Imperial captain?'

'That's an interesting question.'

Persie shrugged and waited for him to answer.

'I don't think I can tell you yet. I only got promoted yesterday.'

' _Yesterday_? And they send you out looking for the dreaded rebels?'

Treadwell smiled bashfully. 'Yes. Yesterday.' He paused reflectively. 'I can tell you I didn't like being a stormtrooper though.'

Persie frowned. She nodded at Lieutenant Amethyst, who had his head buried in the station's equipment cabinet. 'You were one of them?'

'I was, for a time. I think they sort you out pretty quick once you see some action, you know, they can tell who has got a level head and who hasn't.'

'You don't seem old enough.'

He sighed. 'You can enlist at eighteen. For a lot of folks on a lot of worlds out here, a steady paycheck is a steady paycheck. And there are worse jobs than dressing up in white and pointing blasters at people.'

The sheriff leaned in close. 'But it's the _Empire_.'

'I grew up in a part of the galaxy they wouldn't touch with a gaffi stick, all the Empire was to me was a recruitment poster promising me I'd see the universe.'

'Have you?'

'I've seen enough.'

'Enough?' If this was a ruse, an Imperial snare to catch her in, then Persie felt herself slipping in. But this was surreal; captains of the Imperial Army were supposed to be bloodthirsty and relentless.

Treadwell straightened up, remembering himself: 'Enough to know that there are people out there who belong behind bars. I know a lot of people like you and those who live here think we're trying to take away your freedom or whatever, but we're not. We just want to protect you from terrorists.'

Persie shook her head. Maybe they were all deluded, all brainwashed, all loyal to the great cause of the Emperor. 'They never destroyed planets though,' she mumbled.

The captain's jaw tightened and his eyes dropped when he snatched her faint words. 'That wasn't all of us. That was one guy who took it too far.'

There was so much more she wanted to say. There was so much more he wanted to say. But then Lieutenant Amethyst, who had mercifully been out of earshot, re-emerged from the store cupboard.

'Your gear is a joke,' he spat. 'This riot gear is laughable, how're you supposed to quell an uprising?'

'That isn't really our style around here,' Persie said. 'I get by on my wits and my smarts.'

'I knew a smart guy once,' Amethyst retorted. 'And his wits weren't quick enough to stop his head from getting blasted off. You should put a request in to get some updated kit. I highly encourage it.'

'And the Ma'ar Shaddam PSF highfly encourages their remote town sheriffs not to ask for anything that the pirates who deliver the stuff might want for themselves.'

She couldn't see his face, but Persie was pretty sure that Amethyst was looking at her in disbelief. She liked seeing outsiders unable to comprehend their small town ways. The stormtrooper looked to his captain.

'Pirates deliver their equipment.'

'Welcome to the outer rim, buddy.'

His arm ached, pain surging out from his wrist where the ill-fitting cybernetic hand clamped on. He despised it. It was so dead, so inorganic, a constant reminder of his failures, of his removal from that to which he had once belonged. The Force would not flow through the lifeless parts of him.

The Mage closed his eyes. He felt the rotation of the planet beneath him, felt the shifting of it's faultlines. He felt the invisible murmurations in the grains of sand. The wind ruffled his unkempt beard, caressed his face, breathed life into his nostrils. But it whispered no answers in his ear. The Mage asked again.

Should I hide, or should I run?

There was the web of the galaxy, and there were his futures, pulling and shaking the strands, like panicked flies caught in a spider's silken threads.

He saw the war machines of the new enemy, the old enemy, saw looming shadows, old friends. He saw fire. He saw the long fall.

The wheels of the universe would never stop turning.

Something wicked called out to him. It's name was Rage. Rage came as a friend, it welcomed him in and made him comfortable, exchanging with him gifts for which he had yearned but had never the means to acquire himself. Rage took away the pain of what he had lost and it filled him with accomplishment. Rage had two strong hands, and it would lend them to him, and he would crush. He felt the plane of reality unmade shatter along the cracks left by his footsteps.

He saw fire. He saw the long fall.

So they had come for him.

Finally.


	3. Chapter 3

III

The Taste Of Blood

Every footstep was a thunderclap. Every footprint, a crater. The Mage could not tell if the roaring in his ears was the wind that swept up his cloak behind him and stung his face with shards of sand or the rushing of his blood through his veins. His nostrils flared as they picked up the scent of fear, and his teeth were bared in a fearsome snarl. Through the Ma'ar Shaddam desert strode The Mage, his eyes focussed not upon the small ramshackle town to his left, not on the first rays of the rising sun already biting at his neck, not even upon the aching of his wrist and the metal hand that hung from it. He was focussed on _them_.

The Mage knew from watching them all night that two Imperials were still in Maksur and had slept within the Sheriff's station, but the rest, however many they had sought fit to ensure his death, were all still inside the ugly little white ship toward which he now marched. There could be a thousand stormtroopers inside the craft, it would not be enough to take him, not now, not now that he had let in Rage, not now that he had decided to fight. There was not enough in the whole galaxy.

They had killed him once. They would not kill him again.

He stood perhaps ten feet away from the empty cockpit, the pilots no doubt still curled up within the ship's belly for it was still early. The Mage closed his eyes and reached out with the Force. He sensed them, not even two dozen, men and women whose souls quivered with a fear that their minds couldn't comprehend. He considered giving them a warning, a fighting chance, but then realised they would not do the same for him.

The Mage raised his left hand, his good hand, his fingers reached out, sifting through the atmosphere, letting the thread of the Force come to him. He felt the ship, its size, its weight. He let his heart slow and inhaled deeply through his nose.

The Imperial Sentinel-class landing craft began to rise slowly off the ground. The sands shifted as the weight of the ship lifted, inching up against gravity under ancient power. The Mage raised the ship higher, higher still until he felt the realisation and agitation of those within, suddenly beginning to rattle about in their metal box, waves of their fear and confusion washing over him, fueling him. The Force responded now to a part of his heart he had never before revealed, and it was making him stronger.

The Mage turned his hand, palm down, and pulled his fingers into a fist. The ship buckled and collapsed in on itself, compacting under the immense pressure of the Force. He heard the first screams. His fist tightened and with it the ship squeezed tighter in on itself. It was like screwing up a leaf. The screams grew louder as the ship grew smaller, drawing further and further into itself, barely recognisable as the landing craft now, more a mangled husk of torn metal, bleeding at the seams. Finally, it became nothing but a coffin, and The Mage let it go, the ship thudding back down onto the sands.

He looked upon his handiwork and felt nothing. He hadn't expected to, he didn't anymore.

The Mage turned, now facing Maksur, and saw that a group of townspeople had gathered at the sound of screams and had witnessed his destruction of the ship and the stormtroopers within. Amongst the crowd he saw the Sheriff, the one who had been watching him for a few weeks, and next to her he saw the other Imperials: a very pale captain, and a stormtrooper lieutenant, purple pauldron over his shoulder, who was now walking towards him.

'It's _you_ ,' the stormtrooper growled. 'I knew it.'

The Mage felt a most unexpected ripple through the Force. He saw fire. He saw the long fall.

Lieutenant Amethyst raised his blaster and fired, but The Mage caught it on the Force, the blast freezing in mid-air, dithering between rifle and target. The Mage tilted his head to one side as he let bitter memories sweep over him, let his mind wander for a fraction of a second back over the fissures in reality his past life had made.

He sent the blast right back at the trooper and it caught him, high on his right shoulder, close to the neck, but not close enough. Lieutenant Amethyst flew back and landed heavily in the pink sand, his shoulder on fire, the pain searing down his arm that now hung limp by his side and up his neck into his head. He realised that his helmet had been blown off.

Lieutenant Amethyst looked upon an old friend, and The Mage looked back at a face he had seen a thousand men wear.

Amethyst grunted and ran at The Mage, knowing that even had he not just been shot he would be running to his death. He was a stormtrooper now, but he had been made a soldier of the 187th, and he had an order not yet complete.

The Mage picked the old clone up in the Force and flung him way up and way out across the desert. He levelled his stare at the townspeople still watching. They all feared him, even their beloved Sheriff Persie Hotarv.

'Anyone else?'

Captain Kaas Treadwell turned and ran. His troops were dead, his lieutenant tossed through the skies like a ragdoll; he had known that his superiors were up to something when they had sent him down here, and not a more experienced captain, but this was insane. How had they ever expected him and twenty soldiers to take out a Jedi? He twisted his way through the shanty huts of Maksur, hardly a difficult task considering how few there were, and finally threw himself into the Sheriff's office. He had seen a radio in here, he could call for help.

His hands danced over the battered old radio's controls, desperately wondering how he could make the damned thing broadcast on an Imperial channel where someone might hear him. He cursed his commanders for sending him into this trap with not the slightest chance of survival, let alone success. How could they?

As Treadwell pulled on the headphones, flexing the microphone over his mouth, he realised that perhaps they hadn't known. He hesitated. Everyone knows you don't play games when it comes to force users, they surely would have sent in the Inquisitors the second they got any wind of a surviving Jedi down here. Could it really have been a coincidence? Maybe the old Jedi had played his cards too soon. Maybe Treadwell would be commended for flushing a survivor of Order 66 out of hiding.

He snapped out of it and began screaming into the microphone.

'Captain Treadwell to any Imperial ships, Captain Treadwell to anyone! This is a code- uh- code- This is an emergency! I've found a force user, all my men are dead! Repeat: I have found a Jedi!'

The door blew off its hinges and standing in the frame was The Mage. His long grey beard barely hid his snarl.

Captain Treadwell made to shout into the radio again, but before he knew what was happening he hit the back wall with such force he tore straight threw and crashed against a rocky outcrop in the sand behind the station. He couldn't breathe, all the air thumped out of his lungs, and he could taste blood. Treadwell saw The Mage approach again, and was once more lifted up off the ground, his arms and legs powerless to fight back.

Kaas Treadwell, son of a farmer from the Outer Rim, Imperial captain for a day, closed his eyes and prepared for death. But it did not come. Slowly, he opened his eyes again. The Mage was watching him, curiously, the way a collector of rare insects might inspect a specimen he is about to mount on a pin. For a moment, Treadwell's gaze flicked from The Mage to the figure of Sheriff Hotarv who was running towards them, but he quickly snapped back to the man who had him floating a few feet off the ground.

'Tell me,' said The Mage, his voice gravelly and terrifying. 'How did you know? How did you find me?'

'I- We- They didn't know. I'm here about a droid.' Treadwell found it difficult to speak.

'A droid?'

'A probe droid. We sent them out, we got one back. An old one. But still-'

Something like confusion dashed across The Mage's eyes, but the dark Rage rushed up instantaneously to replace it.

'The Empire. They know I am here.'

'We don't! We didn't!'

'But I am-' The Mage didn't dare say it. He was dead. He was buried. And it appeared he had just disturbed his own grave.

Persie Hotarv pulled her blaster out and pointed it at the back of The Mage's head. She took a moment to control her breathing and then spoke in the most intimidating voice she could muster.

'However you're doing that - don't. Let him go.'

The Mage turned to look at her over his shoulder, his withering glare almost sending her knees knocking, but the Sheriff steeled herself.

'Let him go.'

Captain Treadwell was released and he landed back down on solid ground with a painful bump. The Mage turned to face her properly.

'You don't want to do that,' he said.

'Don't want to do what? Shoot you? Oh I would like that very much actually.' Persie spat her words out with venom. 'You have just put my town in the Imperial crosshairs and now we look like traitors harbouring… harbouring whatever you are!'

'You couldn't shoot me,' The Mage replied, calmly. 'You could try, but as I said, you don't want to do that.'

Captain Treadwell got back to his feet, sorely, and pointed sternly at The Mage's back: 'You're under arrest, Jedi scum. As soon as my reinforcements arrive, you're…'

Treadwell didn't get to finish his sentence because his feet were whipped out from under him and he face planted into the grit again. The Mage didn't appear to be taxed in the least.

Persie managed to stutter out a question she was afraid to ask: 'You're a Jedi?'

'No,' said The Mage.

Persie felt herself lowering her blaster, but she couldn't tell if it was the effect of The Mage's mysterious power, or just her own reluctance to point it at anybody. Just as she contemplated putting it back in her holster altogether, Knud Rr, Maksur's resident drunkard and rabble-rouser, stumbled up beside her, gasping for breath.

'What are you pointing it at him for?' barked Knud. 'He's on our side, shoot the kriffing Imperial!'

'Go away, Knud,' shouted Persie without taking her eyes of The Mage. 'Now!'

Knud appeared caught between two minds, but he persevered: 'No, kill the bastard! Shoot him before he brings the whole Empire down on our heads!'

'You've done nothing wrong,' whimpered Treadwell from the dirt. 'It is not you that they will come for.'

'Shut up,' Knud yelled at him. He stepped closer to Persie, too close. 'Shoot him!'

'No! Stand down!'

Suddenly, Knud lunged for the blaster. Persie tried to pull it out of his reach, but the H'nemthe was too fast and grabbed hold of her wrist. The sheriff yanked her arm back and Knud stumbled forward, dragging her down onto the ground. He pushed a huge hand into her face as he tried to pry the blaster from her, tugging at her harder and harder, until she thought that surely the little pistol would break in their tug of war. She strained against him, writhing this way and that to escape his desperate grasps for the blaster. Persie rolled over and away from him, freeing her face and trapping his arm beneath her shoulder and the ground.

'Let go! This is madness, you idiot!'

'But Sheriff, they'll kill us all! Please!'

There was a heartbreaking pleading in big Knud's voice. Persie almost considering giving the blaster up.

'Enough,' snapped The Mage, and he tore them apart, a huge hand clamped on the scruffs of their necks. He was strong for an old man.

Persie and Knud slumped, breathing heavily, looking at the sand in embarrassment, like naughty children being chided by a parent.

'The Empire _will_ kill all of us,' said The Mage, Knud shooting a pointed glance at the sheriff, 'but we need this one alive. I want to know what he knows.'

'I know nothing,' yelped Treadwell.

'Lock him up.'

At least now, Persie mused as she stared at the gaping hole punctured in the station's wall, she could feel the breeze when she sat at her desk. The Mage had put Treadwell inside the small cell and was watching him closely. He had sent Knud home with a few choice words and a stern glare, and Persie was glad; she was riled up enough as it was without having to worry about whether her people were going to try and pull something stupid, which Knud could always be counted on to do. And there were bigger problems threatening her now. A Jedi, for instance, having just murdered a squad of stormtroopers and taken their captain captive. She missed the days when she thought the Jedi were all dead, when they were nothing to her but peculiar characters in stories of the Clone Wars. She missed yesterday. Things had been so much simpler back then.

Now that Captain Treadwell was on the other side of thick metal bars to The Mage, he was looking a little calmer, a little more like the rational-seeming, youthful Imperial she had met. He actually looked like he was thinking very hard, perhaps concentrating on finding a means of escape, or calculating in his merciless, officer's mind how best to turn this dire situation to his advantage. Persie sighed and stopped trying to second guess everyone around her. She put her head in her hands when The Mage began to speak to Treadwell.

'Tell me what you know.' The Mage's voice was deep and hypnotic, the kind you couldn't help but listen to despite the way it made your blood run cold. It reminded Persie of the voices her father had put on when reading her bedtime stories as a child, the kind of voice he would use for the monsters.

Captain Treadwell jerked out his chin and straightened his back: 'I am Captain Kaas Treadwell of the Galactic Imperial Army. I'm from-'

'About me,' The Mage cut in.

Treadwell looked him straight in the eye.

'I know absolutely nothing, other than what I have seen today.'

'And what have you seen?'

'I have seen a single man crush my ship without even touching it, killing all my men inside. I have seen him throw my lieutenant, who appeared to recognise him, through the sky the way a child might toss a ball for his pet. I have seen the handiwork of a Jedi.'

'I am no Jedi.'

'I am not the one you need to convince of that, but I doubt the Inquisitors will listen.'

The Mage faulted for a moment. 'Who are the Inquisitors?'

Treadwell smirked: 'You really have been living under a rock, old man.'

'Who are they?' The Mage shook the bars as he yelled.

'They are your death.'

The Mage turned his back on Treadwell and shot a look at Persie. For someone who had had a gun to his head not long ago, he was acting very trusting of her. She had heard that the Jedi could see into the hidden depths of other people's minds, and it worried her to think that The Mage would be looking into hers. Maybe that was why he had not locked her up too, because he could see that she wouldn't kill him. She was too afraid, too curious, too concerned that he might be Maksur's only hope if the Empire did come at them, all guns blazing.

Persie threw Treadwell a hesitant, almost apologetic look as she delivered her report of the radio systems to The Mage.

'The call he broadcast didn't reach any Imperial ships. It was the wrong frequency and too short a wave. I think the only people who would have picked that up were pirates, and they would have had to be close.'

'Did it not even get to DuuFaan?'

She could hear defeat in Treadwell's voice.

'Not even close,' she replied. He bowed his head.

The Mage stood thoughtfully for a moment, sucking on his teeth and scratching his chin with his ugly, robotic right hand.

'It's irrelevant. They'll still come looking for their lost ship when he doesn't report in in a few days.'

'Thanks to you,' Persie said angrily. 'I don't know what you think we're going to do when they come looking. Even if I turn you in, which I fully intend on doing, they won't believe that you could do that by yourself.'

'They will when I tell them what he really is,' put in Treadwell.

Persie felt like this was all turning into a lose-lose situation, and that very quickly she'd be forced to do something she did not like doing at all: picking a side.

'I need to meditate on this,' whispered The Mage, not to anyone in particular.

Persie could do little but roll her eyes and slump against her desk as he marched out of the station door and back into the desert from whence he came.

The Mage waited until nightfall.

When the stars lay scattered across the great black canvas above him, he came back close to the town, listening to the background noise of the inhabitants rattling about in their shacks, feeling all their energies flow out into the Force, feeling the Force flow through him in turn. He sat down on the pink sand and crossed his legs. The Mage closed his eyes, and with a gentle concentration, lifted himself a foot or so off the ground, levitating in mid-air.

Rage had played him for a fool, it was time that serenity had its turn.

He drew in long, deep breaths through his nose, letting his lungs inflate slowly, letting his chest swell to its fullest, before expelling it all, just as slowly. He did this until the time he had been there was lost to him. Only then did he reach out.

The Mage saw it all as clearly as a map before him, the twisting, jagged cracks of the universe that spread out from him now in every dimension, that split out across all planes of possible futures from his epicenter. Whatever step he took next, whichever direction the Force pulled him in, he was walking on very thin ice. It was an impossible choice; it would all shatter around him no matter what. Doom lingered inevitably.

He looked deeper, reached further.

He found Rage.

Fight, Rage said, as you were born to do. Fight, because you are a weapon built to eradicate evil. Fight, because that evil is everywhere and by hiding you are doing nothing to stop it.

Rage was right. Rage was always right. The Mage felt a shiver in the Force.

He saw fire. He saw the long fall.

At daybreak, The Mage went back to the Sheriff. She was already awake, looking as though she hadn't even sleep, feeding something to the prisoner that was supposed to resemble food.

'Hello,' said Persie as The Mage entered. He seemed different.

'I will fight,' he said unceremoniously, like this was supposed to mean a great deal to Persie.

'Oh?'

'They will come. For him. For me.' The Mage paused. 'Let them. I have cowered too long, betrayed my people too long.'

Persie was confused. He really was a crazy old hermit. 'I'm going to need to evacuate the town,' she asked, 'aren't I?'

'Not if you help me get the two things I need to stop them, to stop them all.'

'You really think you can stop the Empire?' Treadwell looked up, his face haggard from sleeplessness. He reeked of fear. 'I'm sick of people like you thinking we are some terrible war-mongering destroyers. We just want to keep everybody safe. We're just trying to assert a little order.'

'I can stop you, I will stop you, I will destroy the Empire, on my own if I have to. I will burn it all.'

'And what,' snapped Treadwell, 'will rise up in its place? Something worse I guarantee. Are you an anarchist? Or maybe you'd like it if pirates run the galaxy?'

'They already do. Pirates in uniforms.'

Treadwell stared at The Mage and The Mage stared right back.

'All I need are two things,' the old man said. 'A ship, and a lightsaber.'

'You're crazy,' Persie snipped.

'No,' The Mage replied. 'I am Mace Windu. Dead no more.'


	4. Chapter 4

IV

Strands Of The Closing Net

Commodore Genevieve Lauretti of the Imperial Star Destroyer _Dreki_ stared out at the planet of Ma'ar Shaddam through the bridge window, noting that even from way up here in orbit, it looked ugly, desolate, grubby. Her brow was furrowed with deep concern. A few days ago she had dispatched a new captain and a group of the lowest performing stormtroopers down to some backwater little town after a droid in the hopes over-zealous rebels might take them off her hands, and now she was hearing the word Jedi being bandied around. It was to her disliking. Things never ran as smoothly as they were supposed to.

Lauretti's second-in-command was talking at her again, talking at her in that jabbering incessant voice he used when he got panicked. It was no wonder the old fart had never been promoted past captain; he had no grit.

She raised a hand, and Captain Brenac Colmner fell silent.

'In ten words or less,' Lauretti said calmly, 'surmise for me what you think we should do.' The Commodore liked this exercise. It was a good way of finding out who had ideas good enough to pass off as her own without them annoying her, and who amongst her crew was an idiot.

'Well,' started Colmner.

Lauretti withered inside, what a waste of his first word. It was a shame that when she had inherited the ISD _Dreki_ , Colmner had come with it, for she would have liked very much to do away with him. Politics and playing the Imperial game kept Colmner in a job on her ship.

'I'd like to deploy the bombers, Commodore. Flush them…' He paused. Lauretti could tell that he was counting in his head.

'Flush them out?' she finished.

'Exactly, Ma'am.'

A thin smile crept across Lauretti's lips: 'And what of the civilian population of this town?'

Colmner looked at the floor and rolled his cap around on the top of his head agitatedly. 'They aren't in an Imperial recognised settlement, as such, Commodore. And if they were harbouring a Jedi from the Empire anyway…' The captain trailed off and met his superior's gaze sheepishly.

Lauretti straightened herself up and turned on her heel, marching down the bridge to where the communications officer sat below in the pit.

She was tall and thin, with angular features that instilled the right amount of intimidation in the right people. The grey uniform of a Navy Commodore suited her well, as did being at the helm of a star destroyer. She smiled down at the man whose fingers were ready and waiting over the controls to transmit her message to wherever it needed to go.

'Have Commander Mos deploy the bombers, officer,' she snapped. 'Target Maksur. I want to blow that town off the face of the planet.'

Karaz Vile was now stuck between and a rock and a Jedi. All his crew had heard the transmission come through, that apparently some Jedi over in one of the outlying towns they took goods to was sticking it to the Empire. His pirates were getting themselves very wound up over it, chattering excitedly about what they'd do with the hefty bounty that must be on his head, babbling on at how amazing it was that a Jedi was here on Ma'ar Shaddam right under their noses. A scuffle had even broken out amongst two of them as to who would get to keep his teeth as a trophy.

None of it, however, was exciting or amazing or anywhere near scuffle-worthy for Karaz. He had known that there had been a Jedi in Maksur for the last ten years or so, because he had been the one that had taken him there.

It was a long story.

The Elomin rubbed one of his horns thoughtfully. The safe bet was that the Empire had also heard the transmission; admittedly, it had only been shortwave, but he knew only two kinds of people that underestimated the Empire: fools and dead men. The safer bet still was that there was going to be a fight the likes of which he would rather not get involved in. He knew the Jedi they were talking about, and Karaz knew it would cost him a lot more than any possible reward to stand in his way.

Damn that Mace Windu! Hadn't Karaz told him to keep his stinking head down?

It was too late now though. His pirates were already readying themselves for battle, and one thoughtful sadist in his employ was cleaning the torture equipment.

Karaz nodded at his pilot, a Gamorrean they called Wings, and the ship began to rumble into life. Although Karaz was the kind of gangster who liked very much to brag to other gangsters, we could never boast about how fast or how powerful or how strong his ship was, and that was because it was a huge pile of garbage, a cobbled together mess of about six different ships. And not in the charming way either. It was a ship to which the rust had become structurally integral, that seemed constantly coated in a thick layer of grime which repulsed the overtly cleanly Karaz, and was so poorly welded together that he really daren't take it out of Ma'ar Shaddam's atmosphere anymore.

Wings pointed them at the section of endless horizon over which Maksur and it's resident Jedi hid. Karaz put his head in his hands and sighed; he had better make the most of it as it would doubtlessly not be connected to his neck for much longer.

When Lieutenant Amethyst came to, he tried to focus on all the parts of his body that weren't hurting, a trick he learned a long time ago. He quickly found it wasn't working because pain sprang through every inch of him. His leg was badly broken, his shoulder and arm still useless from the blaster hit, and he was finding it difficult to swallow with all the blood in his throat.

He sat upright slowly and peered around. Nothing but pink desert dunes in every direction.

CQ-1381 had been in worse spots.

He lay back down heavily in the sand and tried not to let consciousness slip from him again. Amethyst stared up at the sky, letting his vision blur and his mind wander back to the last time he had seen Mace Windu's face. It hadn't been hidden by that scruffy beard back then, nor had there been such rage in the eyes. Being an enemy of the Republic must have aged him terribly, Amethyst thought with a chuckle. Although not as terribly as sharing his face with a million brothers had aged him. Amethyst knew that the Empire only gave him these kinds of missions out of pity, missions that were supposed to be easy and straightforward, and he knew also that as the old guard retired or got killed off, and as they were replaced with the newer officers, he would feel that pity no longer and he would be cast aside. CQ-1381 would be decommissioned. He let the word roll around in his head for a moment. Decommissioned. Like he was a droid.

He tried to shrug it off. Amethyst wasn't a clone anymore, he was a stormtrooper. He squinted at the sun, trying to gage the time, the direction he had been thrown in. The old soldier tore off some armour, cursing the flimsy white polymer that was supposed to protect him, and managed to fashion something of a splint. It was a messy attempt, but it was enough for him to stand.

Amethyst took a deep breath. He took a step forward and agony split him in half. He smiled. A stormtrooper would have given up by now, only a clone would keep going.

CQ-1381 marched onward; he had a mission still to complete, an old friend still to kill.

'Do you want the bad news or the good news?'

Sheriff Persie Hotarv look Knud straight in the eye: 'Bad news.'

The H'nemthe tried to smile, but his facade was cracking, the hardened criminal she didn't really know becoming a frightened coward the likes of which filled the galaxy.

'Bad news,' he began, 'is that it turns out the Empire did hear that Hutt-spawn's transmission, and a few TIE bombers are coming at us from the North. And it looks like Vile is back too, his ship is coming in from the South West.'

Persie felt her heart sink so deep into her stomach that she thought it would surely stop. That might actually have been preferably to what was about to happen. 'And the good news?' she asked with naive hopefulness.

'The good news is that The Mage is doing, well, doing something.'

'I think he wants us to call him Mace Windu now.'

'That's stupid, he's always been The Mage.'

Persie let a quick laugh bubble out and Knud managed a more genuine smile. She let her hand settle on the blaster in her holster.

'Any ideas, big guy?'

'Run?'

'I was hoping that you were about to say you had a secret arsenal of rocket launchers so we could help Karaz take out the TIEs and then turn the Jedi over to him in the hope that he sells him back to the Imperials so we can be removed from the crosshairs.'

Knud reached out gently and put a huge hand on Persie's shoulder.

'No, Sheriff. I think we should run.'

Persie sighed and for a moment it really did seem like the best option. 'Wait, didn't you say that there was good news? Isn't Windu doing something?'

'Oh yeah,' retorted Knud. 'Meditating.'

Karaz leaned over and pointed at the TIE Bombers at the furthest reaches of their vision, flying towards the same destination as the pirates' ship. Wings gulped nervously.

'Take the middle one out as we can get in range. We have to engage them before they start bombing Maksur.'

'That sounds rather altruistic,' observed Wings hauntily. When Karaz had hired a Gamorrean for a pilot, he had not counted on getting one as eloquent and snarky as the priggish upstart with him in the cockpit.

'I'm in a good mood, and besides, we can't collect a bounty on someone the Empire has already blown to smithereens.'

'Won't they be suspicious if somehow their bombers get destroyed and then we turn up with the intended target for sale?'

'You think and talk far too much,' snapped Karaz. 'Just shoot the skrogging TIE!'

Wings shook his head a little and stamped on the accelerator, punching the ship into top-speed, the rattling amalgamate shedding metal as it blasted over Maksur. Wings gripped the yoke in his meaty hands, a finger hovering over the trigger.

'Fire,' yelled Karaz. 'Fire now!'

Wings hesitated for a moment longer, the TIE's well in range now and probably close enough for their pilots to start wondering whether they should shoot first. But for someone whose species got a bad reputation for being cumbersome and sluggish, Wings was far too quick.

The flying pig squeezed the trigger and the middle of the three bombers exploded in a hail of laser fire. Wings instantly pulling back hard on the yoke so that the pirates' ship climbed up into the atmosphere, the hull, barely holding together, screaming under the effort. Wings shot a glance at the scanners. His plan had half worked; one of the two remaining bombers had broken off from its course to pursue him.

But as quick and slippery as TIE fighters are, their bomber brothers are not. Wings had more than enough time to reach the peak of his arc and slam the throttle down, gunning the ship back down toward the planet's surface, straight at the bomber. It fired off a few shots, missing of course, before Wings blew it away too and flew through the exploding wreckage.

He looked back over his shoulder at Karaz, who was gripping the arms of his command chair very hard.

'Pretty good, eh?'

'Just the get the last one, Wings.'

But the last one was a good little pilot and had stayed on task. The TIE had almost reached Maksur, was almost ready to drop its payload. Wings opened the throttle up again but already he could tell that his piece of junk wasn't going to be quick enough. He cursed the ship silently, and then Karaz cursed Wings' cockiness out loud.

The TIE pilot released the first bomb and watched as it sailed through the air towards the centre of the shanty town. He flew on and then came back around in a steady arc for a second pass. If he made it back to the _Dreki_ he promised himself that he would kick up a fuss about not getting a fighter escort. But then, out of the corner of his eye, he caught sight of something rather startling, and realise that he probably wouldn't make it back after all.

Just before the pirates' ship shot him down, he saw that the bomb he had dropped, had not really dropped at all, but remained frozen in fall, a few metres above the roofs of the huts below.

Sweat broke out on Mace Windu's head as he held the bomb off Maksur. With all the strength he could muster, he pushed it back with the Force, and all the townspeople watched as it flew back up into the sky and exploded above them.

The old Jedi collapsed onto the ground and Persie came rushing over to him.

'That was amazing!'

Mace Windu smiled. 'You should've seen what Yoda could do.'


End file.
